


What Love Feels Like

by EntameWitchLulu



Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! ARC-V
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, F/M, implied one-sided Kurosaki Ruri/Yuto
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-16
Updated: 2020-11-16
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:06:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,401
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27593864
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EntameWitchLulu/pseuds/EntameWitchLulu
Summary: Yuto offers to teach Yuzu how to XYZ summon. He regrets the things it makes him think, and the ways it makes him feel.
Relationships: Hiiragi Yuzu/Yuto
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12
Collections: Yu-Gi-Oh! It's Time to G-G-G-Gift! [Mini-Exchange]





	What Love Feels Like

**Author's Note:**

  * For [trainerlyra](https://archiveofourown.org/users/trainerlyra/gifts).



It’s impulsive. It’s stupid. But when she waves at the blue-haired Fusion spy and parts ways with him, when she turns around looking down at the green card in her hand, he can’t help himself. He can’t help the burst of sudden jealousy, the tension in him when he sees  _ her _ holding that card, when he knows that hateful Academia spy is spending all that time with her. 

He meets her eyes when she startles, when her eyes widen as she notices him, just barely in her sight in the shadows of the alley. He steps forward, speaks before he can stop himself.

“Would you like to learn how to XYZ summon?”

* * *

Yuto has made a mistake and he knows it, but he’s not exactly sure how big or deep the mistake is yet. It just skitters down his spine, a shadow that tails at his heels, reminding him that this is not what he should be doing. Even the bright, cheery sunlight that filters through the white-blossomed trees of this tiny copse of the park they located for this lesson can’t chase away that creeping darkness, can’t brush away the shadows that cling to his ankles and gather beneath his torn cloak, the dirty, rumpled clothes of one who’s just left a battlefield marking him so clearly as someone who does not belong here.

“Are you okay?” Yuzu asks, tilting her head. “You seem...on edge. I promise Sora’s not around.”

He presses his lips together, somewhat annoyed that she thinks that’s what bothers him — though it is, to some extent. He’s positive that boy isn’t from this dimension any more than Yuto is, and that he isn’t to be trusted. But pushing Yuzu on that will probably make her dig in her heels, so he holds his tongue, and hopes the little spy isn’t anywhere nearby, getting information on him — hopes that he isn’t wrong to trust that Yuzu has nothing to do with the war at all, and won’t pass along what he shows her.

He shakes that thought away like a cobweb. Yuzu is not involved. He knows that. For all she looks like...for all that she looks like Ruri, her confusion and distress at all that’s happened is too true to be faked. It’s a coincidence, her resemblance. Nothing more.

“I’m fine,” he says, after much longer a pause than he should have allowed passes in the wake of her question. “I’m sorry. I’m just a little tired.”

“We don’t have to do this today,” Yuzu says, brows immediately furrowing with concern. “Don’t push yourself.”

It is so like the face that Ruri makes when she’s complaining and worrying about Shun overworking himself that Yuto feels something in him soften and tense all at once. It’s hard, for a moment, to see Yuzu’s face for the image of Ruri’s superimposed atop it. He shakes that away, too.

“No, I won’t take back my offer,” he says. “It’s really not all that difficult. Much simpler than Fusion Summoning.”

He tilts his head.

“Besides I...thought the style might suit you better.”

Yuzu breaks out into a small smile. She shakes her head and her pigtails sway like blossoms in a breeze.

“Well, I definitely can’t say no to such a kind offer,” she says. “And someone like me can take all the help she can get right now.”

“Don’t say such things about yourself,” he says. “Even I can see how strong you’re becoming to protect what you care about. It’s admirable.”

She blushes, lets out a tiny laugh. She tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, and it immediately flies away again in the breeze.

“That’s sweet of you,” she says, but seems to quickly bolt past the compliment — Yuto mentally punches himself for it. What is with him? That was way too strong, even if he meant it. He’s usually not this forward. “So, um...what do I need for XYZ summoning? A special card?”

“No,” Yuto said. He draws up closer to her, and holds up his arm to access his Duel Disk. “That’s why it’s much easier than Fusion. You don’t need any extra cards — just the strength of your monsters already on the field.”

Yuzu leans closer to him as he takes out his deck. He selects two Phantom Knights, and replaces his cards into the Disk. Her eyes are fixated on his movements, the careful eye of someone taking mental notes. There’s so much steely determination in her eyes that it stays him a moment — he’s not sure what happens to his breath, but it isn’t in his lungs for a moment. He quickly takes in a breath, steadying himself. What is  _ wrong _ with him?

“Let’s just take it without the Duel Disk for a moment,” he says. “Here.”

He motions to a nearby low stone wall that sections off this park of the park. Yuzu follows, and smooths down her skirt as she sits beside him. He holds out the cards before laying them down on the stone before him.

“These are my Phantom Knights,” he said. “Take a look at these two.”

“Phantom Knights of the Torn Scales and Phantom Knights of the Stained Greaves,” Yuzu reads aloud. “Okay, are these what you’d use as material to XYZ summon?”

“Exactly. What do they have in common?”

Yuzu frowns. She squints at them, screwing up her face. For a moment, her fingers dance over the two cards, eyes flicking back and forth between them. A bit of her bangs slides from behind her ear, over her forehead, but she doesn’t notice.

Yuto doesn’t think about it. For a moment, it’s like he’s with Ruri again — sitting next to her on a bench while they compare the cards they drew from their latest booster packs, the strands that frame her face sliding out of place, slipping from her updo after she refused yet again to get a haircut. He reaches up for that loose strand, pushes it back behind her ear. As casual as ever. The way they’d simply touch each other without thinking about it, without making a fuss.

But then he remembers that she isn’t Ruri, and Yuzu startles, eyes wide as she draws back, more from surprise than offense. He jerks his hand back. His face heats. 

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I...”

His hand is  _ shaking _ . He has to press it down to his lap, tilt his head away and hope that the shadows of the trees covers the heat in his face. His heart beats out a melody in his chest, so fast that he can hardly breathe. She is so close to him.

“It’s okay,” Yuzu says, with a faint laugh. She tucks her hair behind her ear again, a faint blush across her cheeks as she smiles. “I’ll bet you used to sit with Ruri like this all the time, right?”

“I...yes. I’m sorry. You just look...I forgot myself.”

“I can understand...sitting next to you makes me think I’m next to Yuya, too. Sometimes, I...almost call you by his name.”

She blushes again, and he can’t look at her. He looks instead at the backs of his hands, pressed hard into his lap so that they don’t tremble. Because...it’s a lie, he realizes. Not all of a lie, but part of one that he’s told her. He’s...

He and Ruri had gotten close so quickly. From the moment they’d met, they’d clicked. As though they’d been best friends for years and years. Everything he said, she had a witty quip for. Everything she did, he was on her heels to egg her on to whatever silly idea she got into her head. When Shun had jokingly asked if they were dating, Yuto had said of course not.

But...

But he  _ did _ like Ruri. He liked holding hands with her. He liked the way she would ruffle his hair, and lean her head against his shoulder while they waited for the bus. He liked going to the amusement park with her, just the two of them when Shun couldn’t make it. He liked winning prizes for her, and riding the roller coasters together even though he  _ hated _ roller coasters. He liked laughing with her.

That was...that was what you did with someone you loved, wasn’t it? He had loved Ruri, hadn’t he? He’d never asked her out, and she’d never asked him out. But when she asked him to go places, just the two of them, of course he always said yes. When people asked if they were a couple, and Ruri just giggled, and Yuto shook his head with a blush, they never actually said they  _ weren’t _ . When Allen made jokes about them getting married, they’d laugh, but never deny it. When Ruri asked him once if she could kiss him, he’d said yes.

That was what you did, when you liked someone? When you cared about them? Hadn’t he been in love with Ruri? Wasn’t that what love was supposed to feel like? 

Why, then, did Yuzu feel so much  _ different? _

Why did his skin feel like electricity when she was so close to him, when he could nearly feel her breath against his skin as she leaned down to look at the cards? Why did his throat feel dry, barely able to speak, when she looked at him with those eyes, those eyes that should have been just like Ruri’s, but were somehow  _ different? _ Why did touching her feel like a static shock to his heart — why did his hands need to be held down, to prevent himself from reaching for her, as though his hands couldn’t forget the feeling of touching her. Why could he not stop looking at her lips and wondering if kissing her would be the same as kissing Ruri, or if, as his mind seemed to believe it would be, it would somehow be  _ better _ ?

Hadn’t he been in love with Ruri?

But why had Ruri never made him feel like  _ this? _

“Oh!” Yuzu cries suddenly, eyes lighting up. He jumps and his heart ricochets like a shot in his chest. Yuzu doesn’t notice in her excitement, pointing down at the cards between them that he has forgotten he put there. “The levels! They have the same levels!”

_ Calm down _ , he orders his racing heart, his burning cheeks.  _ Calm  _ down.

He swallows back the memories and he remembers where he is.

“That’s right,” he says, and he’s relieved at how his voice stays steady. “They have the same level. That’s how you make an XYZ monster.”

He slides the cards on top of each other, and retrieves a monster from his Extra Deck. He places the rank three monster on top.

“Ooh,” Yuzu says, eyes lighting up with understanding. “I get it! And then this is...not a level, but...”

“That’s it, you already know that much,” he says, smiling at her enthusiasm. “It’s a ranked monster, Rank Three. It won’t be affected by effects that are based on level.”

“That’s really simple,” she says, grinning. “Wow! I should have learned this first!”

He can’t help but laugh — quietly, but a laugh nonetheless. It’s the lightest sound he’s made in...he doesn’t know how long. And she smiles at him. It’s a smile that takes his breath away, in a way that it shouldn’t. It’s Ruri’s face. Ruri’s smile. And yet, for some reason, this is the one that leaves his lungs breathless, that makes him feel as though he’s drowning. That makes him want to lean forward.

He’d kissed Ruri. When she’d asked, when she’d reached for him, but he’d never started it. He’d never been the one to reach for her first. It had never been on his mind.

But sitting here, inches from Yuzu, inches from her soft magenta hair, her bright blue eyes, the soft pink of her lips...he finds himself suddenly wondering if she tastes like flowers, like the faint perfume that he isn’t sure is hers or the trees’.

The breeze picks up, and his cloak begins to flap lightly in the throes of it — the faint flicker of black on the edges of his vision snatches his breath back, as the darkness that had been pooling under his heels suddenly envelops him.

The memory of screams rings in his ears, the sound of buildings cracking under their own weight. His breath coils in his throat and knots as he remembers the last time he saw Ruri — her back, walking away from him, lugging water to the medical tent. She was gone the next morning, only a disappearing scream for help left in her echo.

What is he doing? Suddenly Yuzu’s eyes are Ruri’s, looking at him with betrayal. What is he  _ doing _ ? He flinches back before he knows what he’s doing. He barely manages to snatch up his cards.

“Yuto?” Yuzu asks, but he can only see Ruri. He can’t see the girl who sets his blood on fire through the sight of the girl he thought he loved, the friend who is gone because he couldn’t protect her.

The friend he’s betraying by falling in love with someone else, while she is stolen away. The friend he’s betraying every moment he spends not fighting to get her back.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I have to go.”

He runs before she can protest. He runs with his cloak billowing from his shoulders like the shadows that want to drag him down, like the darkness that coils around him and reminds him where he belongs — on the battlefield, away from flowers and sunlight and girls who make him dream about kisses that taste like blossoms.

He doesn’t stop running until he’s back in the darkness. Until he’s enfolded back into the shadows of narrow alleyways, until he’s managed to hide his face inside his mask and goggles, until he’s collapsed to his knees behind a dumpster and curls into the tiniest ball he can make of himself, as though that can make him disappear, as though that can hide him from Ruri’s reproachful eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he begs, though he’s not even sure what he’s begging to be forgiven for. Not sure who he’s begging forgiveness from. “I’m sorry.”

He tucks his head into his knees and wraps his arms around himself, and he lets himself sink. 

He tries to make himself forget.


End file.
